Through, Not Around

August 5, 2026 · Even Though I Walk by Bethel Music, Paul McClure & Hannah McClure · Psalms 23:4

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.

Psalms 23:4

Psalm 23 has six verses. Thirty-seven songs in this catalog map to it, and they do not spread out. Verse 4 takes the largest share by a wide margin — the valley, not the green pastures, not the still waters, not the table prepared in the presence of enemies.

The psalm is read at funerals for its comfort, which makes the clustering easy to misread. Songwriters are not avoiding the hard verse. They are going to it first.

The reason is in the preposition. David walks through the valley. Not around it, not out of it, not over it. The psalm makes no claim that the shepherd removes the valley from the route. It claims he is in it, which is a much smaller promise and a much more usable one.

Bethel's "Even Though I Walk" builds on that word and stays there. The song does not resolve the valley. It repeats the walking, which is what the verse does — the comfort in the line arrives while the walking is still happening, not after.

The rod and the staff are worth a second look too. Both are shepherd's tools and neither is decorative. The rod is a club, carried against predators. The staff is the crook, used to pull an animal back from an edge it cannot see. One is for what is out there. The other is for what the sheep is about to do to itself. David names both as comfort.

That is a specific kind of reassurance, and it is not softness. The verse says the danger is real, the route goes through it, and the one walking with you is armed.

Verses 1 through 3 are the ones people can quote. Verse 4 is the one people sing.